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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25040509">Morning Sun</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ghospice/pseuds/Ghospice'>Ghospice</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Last of Us, The Last of Us 2 - Fandom, the last of us part 2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Abby/Ellie - Freeform, Alternate Ending, Angst, Ellby - Freeform, F/F, Gen, Guilt, Trauma, Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 09:29:05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,921</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25040509</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ghospice/pseuds/Ghospice</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Ellie finds Abby in Santa Barbara before The Rattlers gang.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Abby/Ellie, Ellby, Ellie/Abby</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>145</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Morning Sun</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Because if the game gets to end with Ellie changing her mind in about 10 seconds, then anything I write here can damn well be believable lmao<br/>Also I want Abby to hold me in her big strong arms and there is Nothing Wrong With That. Enjoy!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>-</p>
</div><p>The road is dust and grit baked by the heat of sunlight, stretching before her down a long path of palm trees and abandoned homes. It’s such a beautiful day. There are infected milling about like lost souls of another time, but she creeps past them without much hassle. The heat comforts Ellie, and her heart is a steady pump beneath her breast.</p><p>She brings the map out. Looks at the passing house numbered 2423. It’s close. The light is blinding but it sharpens her focus like a well oiled machine. Since living with Dina, she’s grown complacent. She had worried that her reflexes weren’t what they once were. But that's not the case. Someone like herself <strike>like Abby</strike> doesn't truly forget how to move quick, how much pressure to put on a blade to cut through a neck. And she knows she’s more than capable of finishing things, here, on this lovely day.</p><p>Carefully she crosses the empty road, and dashes behind a deteriorating car. She rests her palm on its red rust, and raises her scoped gun, peers through its opaque lens to a shabby home across the street. She locks in on the number. Constance 2425. There. She breathes in dry air and holds it. Releases.</p><p>Joel passes her mind, as he often does in these moments. Like a dull blade being sawed across her heart. Some of her fury from the time before has softened, replaced by bitter biting pain. But the anger still lingers, enough to bring her outside this house with a loaded gun and switchblade in reach.</p><p>She thinks Joel would like it here, in Santa Barbara. He’d like the peace of it all, the warm beach. She can picture him setting up a chair by the soft crashing waves, his guitar strapped over a buttoned up top, his hands strumming the delicate strings. Her face falls and the gun wobbles in her grip. She’s distracted. Fuck. Gotta focus. But it’s hard not to think of him with his killer so near her reach.</p><p>Her jaw clenches as she shakes herself from her daze. She needs to focus now, because there’s no possible way she’s fucking up again.</p><p>Ellie's feet are light as she darts across the road and climbs up the porch. The door is boarded up, but there's an open window. She crouches down and presses her ear to the wall. It's quiet. But she knows not to underestimate who she's dealing with. She moves forward and slowly peaks inside.</p><p>It looks empty. A few overturned chairs and dust caked furniture, undisturbed in the gloomy shade. She slips in and wood strains in a sharp whine beneath her feet. Old floor boards. Shit. She takes cover behind a shelving unit. It's dark and well hidden. She'll see Abby before the bitch sees her. Now all she needs to do is wait.</p><p>The house is silent, holding its breath. Outside bugs chitter in yellowed grass. No one comes running to check on the sound she made. The gun is small and cool between her fingers, the end pointed through a shelf gap. She licks her lips, bites her inner cheek. Then she hears it.</p><p>Movement that's distant, muffled. It takes her a moment of strained listening to realize its coming from below. Basement she thinks. Fine then.<br/>
She stands and edges around the room sticking to the sides. Someone is definitely making noise, shifting things about. Unaware. Good, she’ll be just like Joel was. </p><p>She finds the gap, a hidden section that Abby and her friend must have found too. Her sneaker meets the first step almost silently. God was on her side it seemed. Finally. She stays low and moves down, her gun taut in her grip.</p><p>It’s darker down here but Abby is loud. Her long braid of hair glows in the soft light of a lamp. Ellie doesn’t see the kid.</p><p>God. She looks the same, a woman built like an ox, as Tommy described. She's all uncompromising muscle and strength. She could inflict a world of pain upon Ellie but that won't stop Ellie from trying.</p><p>Abby turns and faces her. Surprise washes over her face followed by disbelief. Her eyes narrow.</p><p>“Don't fucking move,” Ellie breathes heavily, and the other woman crosses her arms, looking almost blase in the face of Ellie's gun.</p><p>“We're gonna do this again,” Abby questions, voice deceptively soft, eyes like flint.</p><p>Yes, Ellie thinks. We're going to do this again. And again. And as many fucking times as it takes for me to kill you.</p><p>The gun is steady in her hand, finger set on the trigger. She presses.</p><p>Pain shoots up her arm and she yells. The gun fires blaringly loud in the small space. She's off target. It slips from her fingers just as Abby rushes her. She pulls out her switchblade but Abby is faster and crashes into her. Ellie gasps as she hits the cement floor like a sack of bricks. She twists her blade and jabs up at the woman's neck, but a hand blocks her. Abby makes a noise of pain where the blade sinks into flesh.</p><p>Ellie tries to buck her off but she's not strong enough. She's lost so much weight, and muscle. She knew she wasn't as strong as last time, but she's never felt so weak before.</p><p>She vaguely realizes there's an arrow sticking out from her shoulder, but the pain is distant, unimportant. She grits her teeth and pushes, but Abby doesn't budge. The woman holds herself there like immovable steel, her hair a wild mess and a trickle of sweat running down her cheek.</p><p>“Get the fuck off me!”</p><p>Ellie’s hand shoots forward and Abby bats her away, the dull slap of skin meeting. The older woman manages to grip Ellie's hand and pin it under her knee. She squeezes Ellie’s other hand tight, preventing her from striking out.</p><p>“Tell me why I shouldn’t kill you,” Abby heaves, her brow drawn tight as she glares down at Ellie, “I've got no more time for this shit.”</p><p>With her other hand Abby pulls her pistol out from its holster. She clicks back the safety and aims it at Ellie's forehead. Ellie feels the urge to spit in her face. </p><p>“You murdered him, you fucker,” she licks at the back of her teeth tasting blood. She’s always tasting blood.</p><p>“So I’m gonna have to kill you to stop you chasing me?” Abby’s eyes flicker over Ellie, taking in the state of her, “you’ll keep trying.”</p><p>“You need to die,” Ellie says, and even she can hear how tired and weak she sounds. To her right, atop the staircase she hears the boy move. She’d forgotten he was there. Funny, seeing as he shot her.</p><p>“You came alone?”</p><p>“Fuck you.”</p><p>“I’ll take that as a yes...Lev,” she jerks her head, gives him a look, “go take a look, be careful.”</p><p>“You’re not going to...” the boy begins, soft and unsure.</p><p>“No. Go on.”</p><p>Ellie hears his steps recede. This would be a great time to kill Abby if she'd take her knee off her hand for two seconds. She tries to flex her fingers, grip at Abby's knee but the woman pushes deeper causing her to groan.</p><p>“What will it be?” The gun presses against her temple, a cool ring of metal. If she were to jerk forward Abby’s fingers might even slip and pull the trigger by accident. The thought doesn’t bother Ellie like she thinks it should. Maybe because Dina’s not here, only her, so it doesn't really matter.</p><p>“Do you want to die,” Abby asks.</p><p>Ellie doesn't answer, instead closes her eyes and the same face that’s haunted her appears. Joel. She’s in the same position as him, but it's a pistol not a golf club that will splatter her brains across the floor. Anger boils.</p><p>“I want you to die! You don’t get to live while he’s dead. You don’t get to fucking walk away without paying!”</p><p>Abby stares at her, her eyes grey and still in the dark room.</p><p>“He did.”</p><p>Ellie struggles beneath her, then looks up, “what?”</p><p>“That...man,” Abby starts, “he killed my father. It was never about the cure.”</p><p>Ellie glares back, her eyes hot slits of anger, “I don’t fucking care.”</p><p>Abby nods, “that's fine. But now you know, that's why I did it. The same reason you're doing this.”</p><p>“I’m nothing like you,” Ellie fumes, “i’m not f-fucking…” she trails off. </p><p>Joel flashes in her mind again, and this time he’s smiling, in the dark. Her last memory...She shuts her eyes, hiding the wetness that gathers.</p><p>“You fucking k-killed him,” she spits, her voice shaking, “you t-took him from me.”</p><p>“I’m sorry. That it hurt you, not that I did it.”</p><p>“You bitch,” Ellie gives in and the tears spill down the sides of her cheeks, “get the fuck off me.”</p><p>“No,” Abby's gives a sharp bark of a laugh, and it's black and humorless,” you’ll try to kill me.”</p><p>She’s right. Ellie would, even with her bare hands if she has to. Strangely Dina appears in her mind, with J.J. She wonders what they’re doing right now, while she lays here in disgrace. Dina would be so disappointed. Abby had shown mercy to Dina.</p><p>Ellie bites deep into her lip, disgusted with herself, “I won’t. I-”</p><p>She looks at the woman looming above her, her square jaw and serious face. Her expression is nothing like it was when Joel-...but she still did it. It’s not something Ellie can forget or forgive, its not-</p><p>
  <i>But, I would like to try</i>
</p><p>No. That was fucking different! </p><p>Abby watches her intently, and gives out a huff. Apparently she doesn’t like what she sees.</p><p>“I’m sorry for this, too,” with that she takes the pistol, flips it and slams the receiver end onto Ellie's skull. Everything goes black.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>-</p>
</div>When she wakes she sees nothing, the room cloaked in dark. Night must have fallen and her body is freezing.<p>Surprisingly she wakes on something soft instead of cold floor. It becomes clear that she’s still in the same place. The room is empty, deserted. Abby's gone.</p><p>Great pain splinters out from her numb shoulder and she hisses. The area is raw and there's a deep bloodied hole where the arrow was. Abby or the boy must have pulled it out. Probably Abby. The bitch.</p><p>Looking around Ellie's discovers she still has her pistol, her switchblade and a few belongings. It makes sense, in a strange way. Why let someone live only for them to go outside and get eaten by infected.</p><p>What’s more there's a note on a table near to where she awoke. She turns on her flashlight and reads.</p><p>
  <i>There are no more chances now. I can’t risk it all because of guilt. You come after me again I will put a bullet through your skull. Let it go, go home.</i>
</p><p>Ellie laughs. She’d scream but it would attract company. She kicks the table over, and drives her blade into the trunk of a wooden beam. It embeds deep and she leaves it, sits herself back down against the wall, draws her legs up and crosses her too skinny arms together.</p><p>Go home, Ellie thinks bitterly. Go home to what?</p><p>Dina was gone, Joel. Tommy would never forgive her. And Jackson…</p><p>Jackson was just a place full of haunted memories now.</p><p>No, she can’t go back. </p><p>She can only go forward.</p>
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